As Jackie hopped from tree to tree, her friends, Moegi and Temari right behind her, she could feel the weight of the mission. Her legs, though often full of spring, were now weighed down harder than the weights she used to have during her training with her dad. There was always a feeling that Lee always considered her a son and not a daughter. He largely forgot that the relationship he once had to Gai Sensei was not going to be the same and even though she had plenty of opportunities to point it out, she felt it was better to not be all emotional about nothing. She was a big girl now, a shinobi at that, and she had to carry on the Lee legacy.
“Jackie, if you slow down a little, we’ll still be able to get there before dusk,” Cho-Cho said, her breaths uneven. Jackie snapped out of her trance and reduced her pace allowing Temari to overtake her silently. Jackie wanted to say something but Moegi quickly caught up to her and immediately shook her head at her student.
“You may not have siblings, so it’s probably not clear to you why she’s worried sick about her brother. I’d rather we don’t get on her bad side,” she said in a whisper.
“I heard that,” Temari said, and the entire team nearly froze in fear. “I’m sorry for being aloof. I’m not really big on conversations, especially when I’ve already seen what happens when Gaara is in danger. This is who I am. I’m afraid you’re going to have to get used to it.” With that, Temari returned to silence and kept to herself. Shikaku was also silent on the mission, choosing to remain as far away from his mother as he could. He sighed at the sight of his fellow members being rattled and understood the feeling more than most. It may not have registered to them but that was Temari at her most peaceful, at least among strangers. Somehow his father, Shikamaru was able to make her laugh. He had never really mastered that art yet. His mind went back to a memory he was slightly fond of.
Shikaku loved playing shogi with himself. Shikamaru was too smart to have fun and everyone else was either too dumb to play with him or too uninterested with the idea. Boruto had tried once but like Shikaku, he was a sore loser and vowed never to play Shikaku again, convinced he was cheating somehow. Thus, he mostly found solace playing with his puppet Kakushiken. He always landed at draws but spending the hours doing nothing but was his happy place. Temari appeared in his room and stared at her son, not really saying anything. Shikaku had noticed she was around by sensing her familiar aura but chose to pretend he hadn’t noticed. That didn’t last for long.
With every new play, he would constantly feel her gaze on him and it creeped him out. He’d once heard that when he was young, he never really wanted to be away from Temari for too long. He didn’t believe that story one bit. Finally, he decided to speak up.
“How long are you going to watch me, Ma?”
“Oh, so you noticed. You want to talk about your room, young man?”
Messy was putting it lightly. Shikaku just didn’t know how to organize anything. There was simply an art to how everything ended up in the wrong place; a shirt collar placed next to his soggy plate, his hairbrush lodged at the corner of his bed, his toothbrush lying next to his sandals, his summoned puppy lying in a pool of what was clearly not water, everything was perfectly chaotic. The smell sizzling from that room was a bizarre concoction of several strong elements that clashed together so beautifully that one’s nose may have given up on the idea of disgust all together. Temari’s willpower was the only thing that stopped her from leaving the room.
“If I said no, would you be mad?”
“Yes.”
Shikaku was silent for a bit.
“But I don’t want to talk about my room.”
Temari slowly disappeared and Shikaku’s heart stopped. Her return was certain but the range of emotions that would follow are always difficult to guess so he panicked. There was probably something he could do to fix his room but everything was such a colossal mess that merely finding a place to start would take minutes of thought and that was exhausting to think about. Temari’s footsteps returned and Shikaku held his heart in his hand, certain whatever punishment was coming would be brutal. Instead, Temari was armed with a bucket, a mop, cleaning detergent, gloves and a stern face.
“We’ll do this…together.”
Shikaku was stunned. Normally, she’d just shout for him to do it or she’d put him in a coffin or something. But her look did not soften.
“The next time though, Shikaku, you’re not getting off easy.”
There it was. Words he’d be a fool not to follow. Temari walked in and immediately got hit with the pungent smell and had to reconfigure her senses. Once she felt strong enough, she gave instructions on her part and where he’d do his. Shikaku merely nodded and the two began to clean the room. Temari told stories about Gaara and how his room was much harder to clean back in the day.. Something about him threatening to kill anyone who even tried to talk to him about it. Knowing the person Gaara was now, it was truly hard to picture that version in his mind. But Temari very rarely spoke in jest so her words were taken seriously. Little by little, the areas that he’d feared approaching for months slowly found the warm glow of bleach and a mother’s affection. Suddenly, a rat popped out of the room, on its mouth a piece of cloth unmistakably being one of Shikaku’s shirts. His blood suddenly flooded with rage, followed by a dark aura that engulfed the room, blocking out the light to a midnight black. Shikaku’s rage turned slowly into fear and his head creaked slowly towards his mother who was now wearing a demon’s eyes.
“Get out,” and in a tone even a rodent could understand, the creature raced out of the room but not before Temari gave chase and whipped out her fan.
“Wind Style: Wind Scythe-”
“Shadow Stitching Jutsu”
The rodent was caught by the technique, unable to escape its fate. Temari flashed a grin at her son and gave him a thumbs-up. She then proceeded to claw at the poor rat with her scythe, ripping its flesh with deep wind blade attacks. Temari bathed in the madness of torture, and even Shikaku decided to step back. It took a short while for Temari to notice the rat was beyond dead. She huffed and puffed, her heavy breaths not very dissimilar to that of a marathon completionist. Shikamaru arrived to a house scarred by Temari’s abuse and immediately understood the situation.
“What do you say we…uh, go eat out or something?” Shikamaru’s expression was unclear, but even Shikaku knew his father wasn’t that tough.
“We’re not going to that cheap place you took us last time. I don’t want us waking up to food poisoning again,” Temari said.
“Yeah, I’m avoiding that too. I guess it was a bad idea in retrospect.”
And so, they went out and-
“Oy, Shikaku, you’re going to slow us down if you keep moving at that speed.” Shikaku didn’t notice his mother approaching him. “You used to love having me carry you on my back. You want me to do that again?”
Shikaku looked at his mother in horror. “No! Are you trying to embarrass me in front of my teammates?” Cho-Cho and Jackie tried to hold back their laughter. Moegi did not even turn to look back at them.
“Then ahead we go. Your uncle needs us at our best.”
“Fine, fine. What a bother.” Temari then returned to the front of the pack and Shikadai picked up the pace.
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